Princeton Drops Its Early-Admission Option

The Chronicle of Higher Education September 19, 2006

By ELIZABETH F. FARRELL

Students hoping to enter Princeton University in September 2008 will not have the option of applying through early decision. The institution's announcement that it will discontinue its early-decision program, made on Monday, came less than a week after Harvard University declared its intent to dismantle a similar program (The Chronicle, September 13).

The early-decision program now used at Princeton guarantees students an acceptance decision by mid-December if they complete their application by November 1. If accepted, students must withdraw their applications to other colleges.

Early-application programs have long been considered controversial because the students who participate in them tend to be white and affluent. Students from low-income families often decline to use the programs so they can compare financial-aid offers from multiple institutions during the regular admissions process.

Princeton's determination was made jointly by its president, Shirley M. Tilghman; the dean of its undergraduate college, Nancy Weiss Malkiel; and its dean of admission, Janet Lavin Rapelye, Ms. Rapelye said in an interview on Monday. They took that course, she added, for the same reason Harvard did.

"We went into this with the goal of doing the right thing," Ms. Rapelye said. "Our early- decision applicants were less likely to apply for financial aid and less diverse than the regular pool of applicants. ... Our hope is that we can make a statement by taking one form of inequity out of the process."

But the timing of Princeton's announcement was no coincidence: Ms. Rapelye said that Harvard's choice had played a significant role in pushing officials to adopt a change they had long considered.

"The fact that Harvard made this decision was important," said Ms. Rapelye. "We didn't know they were going to make that announcement last week, and it surprised us."

According to Ms. Rapelye, Princeton could swiftly implement the admission-policy change because officials had been studying the impact of discontinuing early decision for three years. Harvard's announcement, she said, came at a convenient time for Princeton because an out-of-town meeting with trustees had already been scheduled for late last week. The change in policy, she said, would not have been made without consulting the trustees, who expressed strong support.

In a meeting early Monday evening, Princeton faculty members broke into applause when Ms. Rapelye reported the program would be dropped, she said.

Officials at both Harvard and Princeton have expressed hope that by abolishing early decision, they will compel other colleges to do the same and eliminate some of the pressure students feel to apply early. While no other colleges have announced similar changes yet, admissions officials at competing institutions are taking notice.

At the California Institute of Technology, Rick Bischoff, director of admissions, said Harvard's announcement last week had sparked a flurry of dialogue at his institution over admissions policies. Princeton's decision intensifies the impact on the behavior of his applicant pool, he said, because both institutions have a large overlap of applicants with Caltech.

Caltech does not offer early decision, but does offer an "early action" program that allows students to apply early without making a binding commitment to the college.

Mr. Bischoff said Caltech had no plans to change its early action policy at this time, even though he would like to see changes in the way students go about the application process.

"Too many students approach it with the mentality that they have to apply to one school early," says Mr. Bischoff. "The conversations around their decisions are not based enough on what kind of community they want to be in, or which college will best further their education goals. It's clearly not how we want it to work."